L.A. Film Festival review: 'Fruitvale Station'

There has been some controversy in the critical community over "Fruitvale Station," Ryan Coogler's fly-on-the-wall re-creation of Oscar Grant's last day on Earth.

Some feel it idealizes the young man who was killed by a transit cop in Oakland on his way home from a New Year's Eve celebration across the bay and therefore falsely earns what has so far been rapturous film-festival audience responses.

I was looking for hints of hagiography while I watched the film and was pleasantly disappointed to find few.

Sure, Oscar is shown as a loving father, decent boyfriend to his little girl's mother and wanting to please his own mom. But the terrific actor Michael B. Jordan also makes it abundantly clear that the guy had a dangerous temper and was an inveterate screw-up. That he chose this particular day to resolve to try better may or may not have been true, but while some may find that manipulative, I thought it added another intriguing facet to a wonderfully complex portrayal.

If Coogler's script did somehow stack the deck, the first-time feature director sure made it all looked spontaneous when the cameras rolled. Not just Jordan, but everyone from the likes of Octavia Spencer and Melonie Diaz to the crowd of BART-passenger bit players hit it convincingly, consistently.

Rachel Morrison's cinematography is as alive as the characters, which also helps the movie achieve something rare: the sense that you're walking beside someone through their life. This may be why so many come out of it wishing they could have done something to save him.

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